Plug In Baby
by emmish
Summary: This would be the first time that John would see him directly after a session. Since they had moved in to 221B a few years ago, Sherlock had only indulged three times, and always when John had been away somewhere. NOT age-play! Stand-Alone, explicit PWP in several chapters. Feedback very much appreciated! :P
1. Chapter 1

**Plug In Baby**

The late-June afternoon was sticky, and warm, and grey, like used chewing gum, and the redolent heat had sucked the colour out of the muggy sky like so much fleeting sweetness. A watery sun winked occasionally, optimistically, through thick milky clouds.

Sherlock was reclining on the sofa, his breathing slightly laboured from both prior exertion, and the hot fumes of the cigarette on which he now sucked luxuriously. As soon as he had returned to the flat, he had stripped his pleasantly-aching frame of damp clothes, and eased on his cold pyjamas, which he had put in the fridge before leaving that morning. Now, forty-five minutes and three cigarettes later, he closed his pale eyes and hummed contentedly to himself. His rare jaunts, when he ventured on them, always drained him in the most delightful way imaginable, and the shivery aftermath was one of the few times he would happily give in to utter indolence.

Today had been a record-length session, and Sherlock would have squirmed in glee at the memory if his muscles hadn't been practically useless from overwork. Thank Christ for taxis.

He distantly heard the familiar bang of the front door, and couldn't be bothered to hide his cigarette. Besides, he doubted very much that the open window was doing anything at all to dissipate the bittersweet tang of smoke in the room.

This would be the first time that John would see him directly after a session. Since they had moved in to 221B a few years ago, Sherlock had only indulged three times, and always when John had been away somewhere. He hadn't actually planned this eventuality; it was just that the urge always seemed to hit him harder when there was no reason that he should avoid it. His libido seemed to surge into paralysing action the minute his body sensed that it was finally safe for him to surrender to the thing that, for the most part, was happy enough to lay dormant and quiet.

No amount of distraction, or drugs, or determination to put mind over matter, could change the fact that, quite simply, Sherlock was a man, and he had needs.

And when the need became impossible to ignore, he satisfied it in the fullest, deepest, most intense way he feasibly could, gorging himself shamelessly on it till he was nearly sick with pleasure.

His stomach gave a little queasy roll at this thought, and a few random muscle pangs seem to mirror the sentiment. Huffing a quiet laugh to himself, he took another drag of his cigarette, his long, strong fingers curled awkwardly around the little stick in what appeared to be an almost arthritic display of paradoxical size.

"Evening," John announced to the flat distantly as he entered the living room, fishing an empty polo packet out of his trouser pocket with some irritation. Sherlock took the opportunity to do his daily John-ventory, some post-clinic diagnostics of his doctor. It took only a few languid seconds, and didn't result in any particularly surprising or interesting readings. The slight longing in the doctor's indigo gaze as it flicked out the open window at the sultry, dirty London evening, suggested that he had been thinking about taking a holiday. This was also evident from his recent internet searches.

The way John deleted the history of the sites he visited about city breaks and British seaside getaways was almost adorable, as if he was erasing queries about obscure sexual fetishes and hardcore porn. The fact that he seemed to consider these searches illicit, made Sherlock think that he either wanted to go alone, but didn't want to upset Sherlock by mentioning that fact just yet, or perhaps that he wanted Sherlock to accompany him, but was understandably afraid of rejection.

At this moment in time, Sherlock thought he'd react positively to such a request. Truth be told, he hadn't been on an actual 'holiday' since he was a child, but he imagined that in his current mellow state, which always followed a session and usually lasted a good few days, he could push to a night away in Dorset or something. If John asked.

"You'll never believe what I saw today," John was saying, as he pulled a carton of chocolate milk from the fridge and took a few grateful swallows.

Something he had missed? Sherlock took another drag, wondering if John was going to bother to mention the fag.

He was.

"If you're gonna do it, I wish you'd do it outside."

Not a command or request. A statement of what John would like in an ideal situation.

"Noted," Sherlock replied pleasantly.

"Some bloke came in and he had two extra nipples. I don't think he even wanted anything done about them, it was like he was showing them off. Bit bizarre."

Ah, John. Never one to let patient confidentiality get in the way of a semi-amusing after-work story.

"Did he make you touch them?"

John was leaving the kitchen, and he gave Sherlock a funny look, before shrugging off his light jacket.

"…No? Weird question, Sherlock."

The detective shrugged. It had seemed a reasonable query. "Must be fun."

John chuckled, blushing a bit, and shook his head before he began to head towards the stairs. "Right, I'm officially leaving that conversation there. You …" He paused, looking properly at Sherlock for the first time, his face settling into a frown that was far too familiar. "What have you been doing?"

Suspicion. Lots of it.

"Secret," Sherlock replied enigmatically, meeting John's eyes with a feral grin that crinkled his sharp cheekbones into something tactile and soft and human. John didn't grin back.

"Are you high?" He moved closer, predictably adopting the all-too-frequent 'I'm going to manhandle you because I'm a doctor and you've done something stupid to hurt yourself again' pose.

This surprised Sherlock a little. "No…do I look high?" he asked honestly.

"…You look…like you've been doing something you shouldn't have," John replied carefully. "What have you taken?"

"What do you think I've been doing? Guess, John. Look at the evidence." Sherlock knew he was teasing, but he felt justified. For once, he hadn't actually done anything wrong. Well, not wrong in the sense that John was suggesting.

John capitulated, an expression forming his face into a delightful amalgam of annoyance and reluctant puzzlement.

"…You look like you've run a bloody marathon. And…I don't know," he admitted. "…You're not usually so serene when you come down off a high. You look…happy." He said the last word with some evident awkwardness, as if it might insult Sherlock.

If John thought that the word 'happy' was going to irritate Sherlock, he certainly wasn't about to describe him as looking 'shagged-out,' which - judging by his reddening features and the thumbnail worrying his index finger - he was doubtlessly beginning to think.

"'Shagged-out' would be putting it mildly," Sherlock announced in a calm, convivial tone.

"…I'm sorry, what?"

A nervous swallow. _Definitely_ thinking about it now.

Sherlock pretended he didn't notice John's internal squirming. He absolutely revelled in the fact that John, after all this time, was completely eaten up with curiosity about his sexual habits. He was blatantly obsessed with it, in fact, and _still_ had not had the balls to ask him straight out. As it were.

"And yes, I do mean it in _that_ sense," Sherlock added. Just to clarify. Sometimes John seemed surprised that he did, in fact, understand various sexual connotations and wasn't a blushing virgin. Well, not blushing, anyway.

"Well…good for you," the doctor said quietly, frowning into his flushes, and clearing his throat as silently as he could. Sherlock could _see_ the unasked question, born years ago and never expelled, writhing under John's skin and in his face like a parasite, fed fat and happy on lustful imaginings.

John trudged upstairs, buzzing with tension, to change out of his work clothes.

Sherlock sighed, and stubbed out his dead cigarette in the egg-cup that he had been using as a makeshift ashtray. Their actual ashtray was in John's room, and since it had been a present, it seemed a bit wrong to be filling it with ash and crumpled stubs, even if that was its sole purpose.

John wasn't going to ask. Yet again.

A few minutes later, John emerged in his jeans and a polo shirt and sank comfortably into his armchair, pecking away peaceably on his laptop. Sherlock stared at him until his doctor sighed and gave in under the intense scrutiny.

"Yes, Sherlock?" he asked, not looking up. He only raised his gaze briefly when Sherlock stretched, and a few overworked joints popped loudly, and satisfyingly.

"Ask me and I'll tell you."

"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about," John said airily, indigo eyes on his bright screen. A rogue, feeble breeze seeped into the room, tasting of exhaust fumes and the strong, hot perfume of next door's over-planted window box. Sherlock let the silence tick away patiently, his striking face without expression.

Exactly eighty seconds of ostensibly placid quiet later, and John spoke up. "I don't know what you want. Stop looking at me."

"Don't you want to know where I've been?"

"Not particularly. As long as you haven't been out shooting up somewhere, I don't care."

"You lie."

John glanced up and scowled at the no-nonsense grey-green eyes that stared back at him, still a little dilated and heavy-lidded. The thin, clean sheen of perspiration on the tip of Sherlock's nose and the dent of his cupid's-bow lip was almost invisible. Almost, but not quite.

Irritated by the acknowledgement of his flatmate's damp, pretty features, John sulked in the direction of his blog, sullenly mute. Sherlock tried again.

"I haven't hurt myself. Far from it. It was _highly_ pleasurable. Almost overwhelming, in fact."

Still silence. A sudden, angry car horn pierced the humid air, and encouraged the first nagging prods of a migraine in John's skull.

"You want to know. You've shown commendable restraint so far, I'll admit," Sherlock continued.

No response.

"I'll tell you if you ask me."

"You're starting to annoy me, Sherlock."

"How about I ask _you_ a question, then?"

"No."

"Oh, go on."

"I'm busy."

"Please?"

"Why do you want to tell me so much? Stop trying to piss me off just because I haven't gotten laid in months. It's not for lack of trying, believe me. You don't have to rub it in," John murmured irritably.

Sherlock snuffled an immature giggle at that last phrase, and John looked up at him again, seeing no hint of vindictiveness in his honest, crinkly grin. Shaking his head, John absorbed his flatmate's tobacco-tasting, deep-toned laugh and then offered his own breathless, slightly manic giggle as a sweet sequel.

The tension lifted, they both lapsed into easy wordlessness for a solid five minutes. Sherlock rested his head back, and closed his eyes peacefully. John tapped away at his keyboard.

The next few words from Sherlock were emitted so casually that John's heart took a good few seconds to remember to stop with shock.

"John, have you ever heard of 'fucking machines?'"


	2. Chapter 2

By the time John had summoned the wherewithal to decide that he wasn't going to allow himself to be scandalised (about six seconds, but it seemed far longer), Sherlock had a head-start on his diatribe.

" –after all, you're fairly-well versed in various sexual proclivities, at least in theory if not in practice."

John's imminent migraine seemed to suddenly pulse more softly, as if quietening enough to allow him to fully absorb the blasé pronouncements that were surely pending. He became aware of the readied pressure of his fingertips on the smooth edge of his laptop, unconsciously ready to click it shut. He spoke evenly.

"I know enough to know that you don't own one, Sherlock. Because if you did, you'd probably have no qualms about leaving it in the kitchen for me to trip over."

Sherlock's eyes widened and he thrilled with a welcoming, surprised intrigue. This _was_ an interesting response.

His doctor was always apt to provide him with fascinating snippets of his personality, exposed as little threads in his words and actions, that Sherlock was secretly and painstakingly collating as a rough tapestry in a spare room of his Mind Palace. It was a work in progress, and it might indeed, never be completed. He had never been particularly good at needlework, so it was fairly unkempt and rustic-looking. It had a few glaringly-bare sections, though they were bolstered and added-to fairly regularly, increment by tiny increment.

This latest little morsel, revealing that his doctor would be more perturbed by the fact of a large physical obstacle in his path than the presence of a masculinity-threatening sexual device, deserved a silvery thread -hair-thin, but glittering notably. He tucked it in between two other, thicker threads near the bottom right of his interminable, messy masterpiece. They each represented two different surprising/semi-arousing instances that merited future recall. One was the time that John had jokingly called him 'babe,' whilst doing an impression of somebody on television. The other time was when John had used his teeth to remove a stubborn splinter from Sherlock's fingertip, when the tweezers proved too fiddly.

"Anyway, those things cost a fortune," John said airily, scrolling through his emails. "You might be flip with your money but you'd be more likely to, I dunno, borrow someone else's. You'd be too lazy to set it up yourself, and you wouldn't ask me to do it."

Sherlock managed not to sound as if he was choking on a confusing bolus of shock, wonder, and adoration.

"Wouldn't I?"

"It's a lot of effort to go to just to piss me off."

There was a thoughtful silence, as a sticky breeze sluggishly pushed through the open window, bringing with it the taste of cars and heat and exhausted energy.

Sherlock shifted on the sofa, his bare feet and hands making clammy sounds on the leather upholstery.

"Do you honestly think that every action I perform is done in order to 'piss you off?'"

"Yes." John replied simply. Sherlock frowned, but John glanced at him and grinned reassuringly.

"…So…you don't think I would indulge in something like that purely for my own pleasure?"

"You don't seem to get much physical pleasure out of anything. Food, sleep. You don't like being touched. You don't date. Stands to reason you wouldn't waste your time on orgasms."

Put like that, Sherlock thought, it might have seemed that way to the average human being. He spoke again, voice lowered with a mixture of both caution and curiosity as he fixated his gaze on the ruddy blushes of his soldier.

"…I eat and sleep."

"Well yeah, but mostly because you know that if you didn't, you'd drop dead. You don't _enjoy_ it, it's a chore."

"…I enjoyed that pig leg you got me."

John's wonderful, irritated gaze flicked accusingly at him, and Sherlock beamed internally.

"That _pig leg_ cost me two hundred quid, Sherlock. It's supposed to be a delicacy, not a bloody stand-in cadaver."

"You have to admit that we solved the case because of it. Without that prussic acid…pig flesh is, biologically, remarkably similar to human flesh, you know. And you got it just when I was at my wit's end. You must have had a sixth sense. It really helped me a lot, John."

Sherlock offered the doe-eyed, innocent look that he had perfected when he was a child, and which still seemed to work, at least on his doctor.

"…You're lucky I love you," John murmured, so quietly as to make Sherlock wonder that he had said anything at all.

 _I know_ , Sherlock thought warmly as he reclined back on the sofa. He smirked and opened his mouth to tease John about his declaration, but the doctor got there first, glaring at him fondly with the addition of a stern, pointed finger.

"Not a word, Sherlock. Not a _single_ word. You know what I mean." With a small, private grin, he finally closed his laptop with a conclusive click, and switched the TV on before turning his attention to the detective, who looked no less shagged-out than he had when John had returned home, with mussed, glossy hair and shining skin.

"Go on, then, tell me the story."

Sherlock grinned happily. "It's not very long, though."

"Speak for yourself." They both proceeded to snigger with soft, immature laughter.

"…And it might seem a bit abnormal, " Sherlock tried, fighting back further dirty chuckles.

"Then you should show it to a doctor." They both collapsed further into gusty giggles.

Recuperating somewhat, John's eyes softened and Sherlock's deep-crinkled grin eased into a sweet smile.

"You're not helping yourself with puerile jokes like that, John."

"It's not helping living with a fucking Adonis either, but people will talk, what can you do," John shrugged, affecting a look of nonchalance and irritation, believable but for the slight staining on his cheeks.

Sherlock gaped at him, his damp brow creased slightly in bafflement, and his pale eyes flickering as he physically tried to sort through and decipher that information. He was halted quite abruptly by John's insistent, flat tone.

"You promised me a smutty story, Sherlock. You failed to shock me, so now you have to man up and tell me about it. _If_ it really happened at all," he added jabbingly, humour in his indigo eyes as he stared the indignant detective down.

"Of course it happened!"

"Well then. Away you go," John instructed, flicking his hand with an impatient gesture. He made a show of settling more comfortably into his chair, crossed his arms, and raised his eyebrow expectantly.

Sherlock pouted as if he had decided not to entertain his doctor after all. A few long, intense seconds into a silent staring match, and he relented, took a deep breath, and began. 

**Naughty me – lots of smut next chapter, promise!**


End file.
